568 U.S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 237 part i 



never seen a male take part in any activities at the nest before the 

 young hatched, except for occasional anticipatory food-bringing. 

 The female develops a very prominent brood patch, the male no sign 

 of one, nor has a male ever been observed on a nest. The female 

 deprived of her mate can successfully fledge a brood, but no males 

 have succeeded unless the young were old enough to need no brooding 

 when the female was lost. 



"Both parents are active in feeding the young and in nest sanitation. 

 They eat the egg shells as soon as the young are out of them, and 

 for the first few days they eat the fecal sacs; later they carry more and 

 more of these away. Both parents also were seen to eat nest parasites. 

 At first the adults feed the young by placing their bills into the gullet 

 and pumping vigorously, seeming to vibrate their bodies as they do 

 so. As the young grow this method diminishes and finally ceases. 

 When the male brings food the female usually leaves, but in the 

 early stages while she is still brooding the nestlings, she often just 

 hops on the nest rim and watches while the male feeds them. 

 Occasionally he gives her the food, or she takes some from him, and 

 both feed the young together." 



F. L. Burns (1915) gives the incubation period for the nominate 

 race as "12 to 13 days." O. L. Austin, Jr., informs me that at a nest 

 in his garden in Gainesville, Fla., the period from the laying of the 

 last egg to the hatching of the last egg was 13 days. 



Eggs. — The rufous-sided towhee lays from two to six eggs, most 

 often three or four. They are usually short-ovate or ovate and 

 slightly glossy. The ground color is grayish or creamy white and 

 occasionally greenish white. They are more or less evenly speckled 

 or spotted with "russet," "chestnut brown," "Carob brown," "pecan 

 brown," or "Mars brown," with underlying spots of "light neutral 

 gray," "or pale purplish gray." On some eggs the undermarkings are 

 quite numerous and on others practically nonexistent. The brown 

 spots are quite sharply defined in most instances, often so profuse that 

 they almost obscure the ground, but occasionally the markings are 

 clouded. The spottings generally tend to become hea\der toward the 

 large end where frequently they form a solid cap. The measurements 

 of 50 eggs of P. e. erythrophthalmus average 23.1 by 17.0 milHmeters; 

 the eggs showing the four extremes measure 25.7 by 18.3, 24.4 by 19.3, 

 20.3 by 17.3, and 21.3 by 16.8 millimeters. 



Plumages. — As described by A. A. Saunders (1956), the skin of the 

 newly hatched young bird is flesh colored, the mouth is edged with 

 pale yellow, and the lining of the mouth is pink. The down is medium 

 gray and occurs on the capital, dorsal, humeral, femoral, and secondary 

 tracts. 



